Cloth and Barbed Wire
by Sweet Honey-sempai
Summary: After Kyoto, Tsuzuki struggles with his sexual feelings for Hisoka and his own sense of self-worth.
1. He'd Been Trying

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei.

**How Did This Story Come to Be?:** This is a Gift!Fic for Christmas/Hannukah/Yule/etc. When asking my flist what they wanted in a fic, ehrenyu requested a TsuSoka Christmas fic, "fluffy but not lame". distorted_r seconded the suggestion, and added a request that I include my "personal kink" that I've talked about on LJ before. Finally, eggdrpsoup said I could write anything I wanted, but it was quite obvious she wanted pr0n. And thus, the fic was born. I was originally intending for it to be an epic one-shot, but I haven't finished it yet and want at least part of it to be in time for Christmas, so here is the first section. It's not the shortest one.

**What's With All The Catholicism?:** It's long been a theory of mine, based on Books 2 and 4 of the manga and episodes 3 and 6 of the anime, that Tsuzuki was raised Catholic. Ehrenyu requested that the fic be set at Christmas, and since I'm going to be an Interfaith minister and am obsessed with religion, I figured I'd work Tsuzuki being raised Catholic in here.

**So What Do Those Religious References Mean?:** In order:

**1)** A venial sin is a non-serious sin, or one done without full knowledge thereof. It's contrasted with mortal sin (killing, stealing, adultery, lying, and dishonoring your parents), and the eternal sin of blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, committed in seven different ways: Despair (believing you will never be granted Grace), Assumption (believing that you already have or do not need Grace), Impenitence (refusing to feel guilty over your sins), Obstinacy (refusing to seek God), Resistance (refusing to adhere to what you "know" is true), and Envy (of another's spiritual welfare). Ironically, I'd argue that both Tsuzuki and Muraki have blasphemed against the Holy Spirit: Tsuzuki with Despair and Muraki with Impenitence.

**2)** See my fic "Oni no Ko" for details on their move from Ageo to Tokyo; the story's the same. I'm including how Tsuzuki's mother died in this story, but skipping the "Forbidden Love" storyline, because it's too big a concept to be handled here.

**3)** I made Saya a Christian based on the fact that she's spotted wearing a crucifix in Book 8, during the Valentine's Day Body-Switching story. I'm not _sold_ on the idea, but it's a fun theory.

**4)** Tsuzuki doesn't eat sweets for forty days in the spring because he gives them up for Lent.

**5)** The Maria Kannon is a Madonna and Child statuette disguised as the bodhisattva Kannon with an unidentified child.

**6)** I'll assume you know what Grace is, as well as Mass and the sacrament of Confession that I mentioned earlier in the text.

**7)** Despite its lack of hype, Easter is the most important holiday in the Christian religion, not Christmas.

**8)** St. Teresa of Avila was a nun who experienced ecstatic union with God, and wrote about her experiences. The problem is that spiritual and sexual ecstasy are very similar (religious experiences can even be triggered by orgasms), and her works used language that could be construed as highly sexual (it's even called "Bridal Mysticism" FFS), so a 13-year-old's mind would naturally go straight to the gutter, I think. Quote: "I saw in [the Seraphim's] hands a long golden spear, and at the point of the iron there seemed to be a little fire. This I thought that he thrust several times into my heart, and that it penetrated to my entrails. When he drew out the spear he seemed to be drawing them with it, leaving me all on fire with a wondrous love for God. The pain was so great that it caused me to utter several moans; and yet so exceeding sweet is this greatest of pains that it is impossible to desire to be rid of it […]"

**9)** St. Mary's Cathedral is a church in Bunkyo, which is in Tokyo Prefecture. The building Tsuzuki would have gone to was destroyed in WWII and rebuilt in 1964.

**10)** Not Catholic, but Nakir is an Islamic angel associated with judgment. I Japan-ized his name and made him the angel present at people's individual judgments.

**What Else Do I Have To Know?:** I'm combining the anime and manga (as usual). I place the Kyoto storyline at early November of 1998, which means the story takes place on and around Christmas of the same year. Our boys are physically recovered but obviously not back at work.

* * *

He'd been trying. It had only been a month and a half since Kyoto, but he'd really been trying. He'd sworn to himself that the crippling self-loathing that sat on his shoulder like a parrot had to go. Hisoka wanted him around and as long as there was that lifeline, Tsuzuki was not going to let go of it. There was no earthly good in going back to rock bottom.

But his subconscious was making it hard to convince himself that he wasn't a worthless, terrible person. There was nothing unusual, he knew, about dreaming of making love to the person who'd been your personal savior in more ways than one. There _was_ something unusual—worse than unusual—about fantasizing of tying a rape victim to a bed and pretending that Hisoka would enjoy it. That it wouldn't bring to mind (and be akin to) Magical Barbed Wire or dying before turning seventeen.

And worse, that it wouldn't make "You're in no position to judge me" absolutely true.

Also, Tsuzuki was pretty sure it was some kind of venial sin to evenly mentally refer to an ordinary person as a "savior". Especially in a church.

Most of his spiritual upbringing had been conducted at his mother's knee. Fear had kept the family's Christianity hidden until they relocated from Ageo to the more open-minded, or at least less nosy, Tokyo. Formal Mass was foreign to him, and as far as he was concerned, no priest could ever replace his mother. As life went on Confession became agony. After his death he refused to step foot in a church unless it was part of his mission.

He'd kept some things on, of course. No one except Saya knew why he didn't touch sweets for forty days in the spring. He kept his mother's prized Maria Kannon on a shelf in his bedroom. Sometimes he even said Grace. And he definitely knew that Easter was the more important holiday. But it was _December_ now, dammit, and he couldn't control his inexplicable urge to go to church any more than he could control his sexual imagination.

A terrible combination. This was worse than when Ruka had nicked a copy of St. Teresa of Avila's autobiography from their father's library for them to read when he was thirteen and she fourteen, and ever since he'd never been able to look a nun in the eye without thinking of "this I thought that he thrust several times…"

Hisoka must have thought he was crazy when he refused to be the one negotiating with the nun for Otonashi's diary.


	2. Having Leave Was Odd

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

* * *

Having leave was odd. Tsuzuki had never realized how much time he actually spent either actually working, or doing his best to avoid working. Or running from and to the explosions from Watari's lab. Or perhaps eagerly anticipating and then welcoming Saya and Yuma after giving Hisoka warning long beforehand. Or spending his time watching Hisoka concentrate on the paperwork, with that adorably serious look on his face that he had whenever he was concentrating.

He missed it.

The free time finally rendered him excuseless when it came to cleaning out his apartment, a task he both equally wanted and loathed to do. The dusting and washing part wasn't so hard; it was the sorting and throwing away…the bittersweet memories of his past seventy years of partners. Notes, photographs, a few gifts from partners he'd retained over holidays. He went through the list in his head: this one passed on, this one was transferred, this one was really a spy from Hell, this one couldn't handle the constant sobbing, this one thought I was an idiot…

The cabinets lining the small hallway outside his bathroom proved free of memories but equally hellish. Some of the old sheets and towels were threadbare, thinned with age and constant use, torn at the edges and seams. They would still be useable as rags, though.

It took Tsuzuki a moment to become cognizant of the fact that he had torn the linens only into long strips resembling ropes, neglecting to cut them widthwise. This wouldn't have been such a terrible realization if he hadn't been concurrently hiding them in a box in his bedroom closet.

Briefly he remembered the feeling of relief brought by watching Touda set fire to Shion. And then he remembered Hisoka, whose hot tears and warm body and beautifully thawed heart made it impossible for Tsuzuki to move forward or backward.

He'd go to Mass again next Sunday.


	3. Hisoka Was Popping Up Everywhere

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

* * *

"Hey."

"Hisoka? What…?"

"Saya told me you were here."

Hisoka was popping up everywhere these days. Before, Tsuzuki rarely saw Hisoka outside of the confines of work, but Kyoto had changed that like it had changed everything. Now Hisoka almost seemed to be tailing him; appearing whenever Tsuzuki left the house to go grocery shopping or use the Laundromat, hovering outside Tsuzuki's apartment building and sometimes walking in without so much as a by-your-leave.

"I didn't know you two were Catholic."

"I was raised it," Tsuzuki said, watching Hisoka squeeze into the aisle around him and take a seat on the pew. "I haven't been to Mass in decades, though."

"Why St. Mary's?"

"I went here when I was alive." The words were spilling out like water over a cliff. "The old building, of course, so I really can't point out where we used to sit. Somewhere over there." He waved his hand towards the front of the church.

""We"?"

"Me, my sister…" He couldn't lie in a church. "I had three brothers, and my father."

"Your mother would have loved it."

"What? How did you—…" Empathy. Shit. Tsuzuki's heart seemed to momentarily stop.

"Sorry. Accident. Places like this have too much spiritual energy; it's hard to keep barriers up." Hisoka moved further down the pew, away from Tsuzuki.

Tsuzuki leaned forward, resting his head against his hands folded in prayer position. "But, yes. She would have loved it. Oh, _crap_…"

Tsuzuki hastened to stand, a moment later than the rest of the scant congregation.

"Pray, brothers and sisters, that our sacrifice may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father," the priest exhorted.

"May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands, for the praise and glory of his name, for our good, and the good of all his Church," the rest of the church responded.

"This seems too formal for you," Hisoka whispered as the priest continued addressing the tiny flock.

"It was," Tsuzuki said, sitting again, giving up on trying to participate in the ritual. They were both invisible to the mortal eye, anyway; he wouldn't be missed. "I never liked being here when I was alive."

"Then why are you here?"

"I have no idea," Tsuzuki said, truthfully. "It felt…like something I needed to do."

"Mm. I can sympathize with that." Hisoka stood. "I get the feeling like you want to be alone."

As much as he wished Hisoka would go, Tsuzuki wished he would stay. "You don't have to go if you don't want to."

"No, it's fine. This place is giving me a headache, anyway. By the way, there's an angel sitting over _there_…" Hisoka pointed towards the left ceiling corner of the altar wall, "…who's been watching you probably since before I got here."

"What?" Tsuzuki blinked. "Why is it—?"

"I don't know who it is. I can't see them; only feel them."

"What's it want?"

"I can't tell. Thoughts of angels and demons are off-limits to me." Hisoka frowned. "Their feelings used to be, too."

"Your Empathy's expanded?"

"That, or it's purposely making its presence known." Hisoka paused. The light changed in his eyes for a long moment as his Empathy tried to connect with the angel's feelings.

"It's sad," Hisoka finally reported. "And it's…it's waiting."

"For what?"

"I think it's waiting for you to do something. It won't tell me what exactly, but it's been waiting for a while…and…there's hope. It thinks you'll do whatever it wants you to do…it didn't before, for whatever reason."

"To do somethi—…and it won't let you know who it is?"

"Nope."

"And you're absolutely sure it's an angel?" Tsuzuki said, moving to rise.

"A demon couldn't have sat there that long without going crazy. This church has a lot of holy energy." Hisoka touched his head and frowned. His headache was growing worse. Between the angel and Tsuzuki, the mental barriers were strong enough to make it feel as if his head was slamming against a concrete wall. "I have to get out of here."

"Oh, yeah, sure…" Tsuzuki moved his legs to allow Hisoka past him. But instead of disappearing as Tsuzuki expected, Hisoka stood in the aisle, chewing his bottom lip. "Hisoka?"

Before Tsuzuki could properly react Hisoka leaned over and kissed him. This wasn't anything new. The first time was in the fire—Tsuzuki had almost changed his mind. That kiss was more desperate than romantic, granted, but it hadn't been the last one. At the Infirmary Tsuzuki had come to expect one at least every few days. Before his fantasy had started in earnest Tsuzuki himself would initiate them sometimes. Afterwards only Hisoka did, and lately he seemed to be picking up Tsuzuki's projected slack.

Tsuzuki's hand twitched and moved almost of its own accord to grab Hisoka's arm. Half to disappointment and half to relief, Hisoka pulled away before the touch occurred. Tsuzuki watched Hisoka straighten up, and then send out his Empathy.

"Whoever it is, they're happy about that," Hisoka finally said, and teleported away.


	4. He Found It

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Yami no Matsuei

* * *

He found it, packed away in a closet, underneath a stack of larger boxes.

Tsuzuki barely remembered the last time he'd held it in his hands; it must have been…April of last year? Yes, when Hisoka decided to stay on as his partner. He'd made a lot of progress on it that month, but he put it away after the Sagatanasu disaster.

It really _was_ time to throw it out. It was like an animal suffering, whose immature owner preferred prolonging its tortured life to allowing it peaceful death. The wastebasket was practically inviting it in.

Tsuzuki thought of her, and then of him. And he couldn't bring himself to throw his tormented pet away.


	5. His Pet

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

* * *

"You seriously know how to crochet."

"Why do people never expect me to be good at anything?" Tsuzuki said, smiling. His pet, a skein of yellow yarn, sat on the sofa next to him, attached to an intricately-patterned long train of fabric. A silver crochet hook sat in his right hand.

Hisoka had come in unannounced.

"I expect you to be good at a lot of things," Hisoka said, taking a seat on the other end of the couch. "Just not crochet."

"I'll have you know I am _very_ good with my hands," Tsuzuki said before he caught himself. He cleared his throat and threaded the small loop of yarn around the crochet hook. He couldn't make out if Hisoka had taken that the wrong way.

"How'd this come about?" Hisoka finally asked.

"My sister," Tsuzuki said, not taking his eyes off his work. "Ruka was very adamant that all boys should learn how to do four things: dance, garden, cook, and do needlework. She said it would help us get wives, but I think she was just tired of being surrounded by "boy" things. Mom passed when she was nine and she never really had any girl friends, so if she wanted to play she got stuck rolling in the dirt or fighting. I mean, she liked it, but she also liked to do all these other "girly" things and she didn't want to do them alone. But the twins were busy being underfoot and our older brother was busy resenting our existence, so she couldn't teach them anything."

"So it was just you left, then."

"Just me," Tsuzuki said, laying down his labor. "But even if our brothers _wanted_ to learn, I would've done it anyway. I would've done anything for Ruka. She was my best friend. Scratch that. _Only_friend."

"Considering how much Meifu worships the ground you walk on, I find it difficult to believe that you were so unpopular when you were alive."

"People here are used to stranger things than purple eyes. Meiji Japan…well, you saw it."Tsuzuki picked up the yarn and hook and returned to his work. "So if you saw me anywhere without her, there was a good chance I was miserable."

"What's that you're working on?"

"A blanket."

Hisoka eyed it, and frowned. "How long have you been working on that?"

Tsuzuki was hesitant to confess. It was pathetic, on the one hand. On the other hand, Hisoka was sitting in his living room having a conversation with him.

"Since I was seventeen."

"_That_ long?"

"Ruka suggested that it'd be something nice to give to any future bride of mine. I never honestly expected to get married, ever, but I did it to please her." He stopped for a moment, mid-crochet, and stared at his union of hook and yarn as if staring at the distant past. ""Make something for the person you love most in the world", she told me. She could be really sappy sometimes, especially around when she got married. I was actually planning on eventually giving it to _her_. I didn't want to marry her, of course, but she _was_ the person I loved most, and I never counted on having someone else to give it to, anyway."

"So…why…?"

"Sh-she…she died. And I was hospitalized. Because—"

"I know why," Hisoka said quickly.

"Hisoka?"

"I've gotten better at sneaking into the records."

Tsuzuki smiled weakly. "I'm gonna tell on you."

"No you won't. You didn't the first time."

Tsuzuki made a short, acknowledging noise, and returned to crocheting. "Not long before I died," he continued unbidden, "my father found out where I was and came to see me. He brought it with him…he'd decided to move to England and I guess he didn't want that reminder of us with him. So he left it there, and after I died I decided to take it with me. No one else would want it."

"But you've just been working on it lately?"

"I've been working on it off and on for the past seventy years. More off than on, though. I couldn't even stand to look at it eighty percent of the time. After Tatsumi and I broke up I thought about destroying it completely, but I just couldn't. Every once in awhile I would find a reason to work on it."

"Such as?"

"I did the most work on it in April last year."

"That's when we…became partners," Hisoka said, his voice trailing off towards the end of the sentence. His face was slightly flushed. Neither spoke for a moment. "This is the most I've ever heard you talk about your life."

Tsuzuki paused. He had barely realized he'd been talking. "That's true, isn't it. I guess…I've been thinking a lot, lately."

"That's unusual."

Tsuzuki stuck out his tongue. "About the past, I mean. My sister, church, this," he held up the incomplete blanket, "my old partnerships, everything. That's what sucks about sabbatical. You don't have too many distractions."

"I like it."

"Hisoka?"

"Tsuzuki, do you realize that you know a ton of shit about me while I know almost nothing about you? For fuck's sake, I snuck into the records hall just to find out how you died, and you've known about what happened to me for almost two years."

"Is that what you meant by what you said on the Philosopher's Path?"

"At that point I was worried about you more than anything else, but, yes. You know how I died and what my life was like, and all I have is that memory I stole from you outside the bar, and something that could get me fired."

Tsuzuki felt a pain in his stomach. "It's…you're absolutely right that it isn't fair."

"You told me that you didn't care what it said about you; that you still didn't want anyone to know. Are you still holding onto that?"

"Why are you asking me this?"

"Because you've been hiding something from me and it's driving me crazy."

The pain intensified. Tsuzuki thought of the ripped-up sheets hidden in his closet and his hands began to shake.

"And I am trying to keep out of your head because _you_ should be telling me what's going on, but you're making it really fucking hard."

"You're not probing to try and figure out what kind of person you're involved with?"

"I know exactly what _kind_ of person I'm involved with. You've just been hiding the _details_." Hisoka watched for a long moment as Tsuzuki stared silently into space, his hands methodically working the crochet needle. "Can you at least tell me one thing?"

"What is it?"

"Why did you become a Shinigami?"

"Wh-why do you want to know?"

"I'd like to know why you stay in a job that makes you hate yourself so much that you want to kill yourself."

Tsuzuki heard a shake in Hisoka's voice as the last words tripped out of his mouth. It was like a beggar falling at his feet and clutching at his clothes, crying out for food.

"Wh-when…when I died, at my judgment, Nakiru asked me where I wanted to go," Tsuzuki started slowly, his hands moving in time with his voice. "You know, like he asks everyone. I told him I wanted to go to Hell. He said I didn't belong there. "They'll rip you apart", he told me. And the time I didn't really think about being a Shinigami, and when they told me I shouldn't be in Hell I said, "Well, send me to Heaven". I…I wanted to see my mother and sister again, so badly…I was going through that tunnel when they stopped me."

"Who? Your…your mother and sister?"

Tsuzuki nodded mutely, torturously. "They said that even in Heaven I wouldn't be happy. I hated myself too much. I'd be surrounded by people who I'd think deserved this place more than I did. I felt like that during life, so it'd be worse there…They told me I wouldn't be ready for Heaven until I'd actually _lived_. I still haven't figured out what they meant by that."

"Tsuzuki…"

"They promised they'd send me a sign when I was ready to be with them. And before I went back through the tunnel Ruka told me I should be a Shinigami. She said maybe it'd help me, since I'd be doing the work of angels; leading people back to God." He remembered the poor girl in the Count's novel, Ruka's namesake, saying exactly what his sister had said in 1926. "You've had a bad run of it with cases, Hisoka, but it isn't always so hard. Sometimes I'd get people who were staying on Earth because of fear, or who were trapped. They wanted to go to Heaven. They were grateful…but the ones you've seen, and there were hundreds more before you came; the ones who wanted to stay on Earth, who didn't want to leave their loved ones, the ones who resisted…every time I'd ask myself, "How can I do this? I'm taking their will away from them. I gave up my life, what right do I have to _take_ theirs?"."

"You didn't take anyone's life," Hisoka snapped. "They were _already dead_, Tsuzuki. Nature or God's will or whatever already said, "Okay, that's it". _They_ were the morons causing themselves needless pain by refusing to accept it." The words escaped before he consciously registered them: "It hurts less when you stop fighting."

They were both seized by a fit of pained silence. Tsuzuki fought desperately against the image of a bound Hisoka writhing beneath him.

"I don't see why _I _should be the one making someone do something they're terrified of doing," Tsuzuki said, hoarsely. "I still don't know what gives me the right…and then there were people like Kazusa, who weren't supposed to die, who got caught in the crossfire because of me. I used to go and beg Nakiru to send me to Hell but he refused every time. He kept telling me that I didn't belong there, no matter what I did, _especially_ since people were waiting for me in Heaven. To get out of Hell I'd have to reincarnate on Earth and that'd just prolong everyone's suffering. It's been over seventy years, Hisoka." His voice began to crack. "Seventy-plus years of waiting for Heaven and wanting Hell. And then this whole _disaster_ with that bastard…last month…in Kyoto…I decided that if I didn't belong anywhere, then I had to be somewhere I wasn't going to hurt anyone anymore."

"Then you belong with me," Hisoka said, quietly.

"Hisoka?"

"I don't know what the hell it is you're hiding from me, but whatever it is, it can't hurt me. It's _you_, for fuck's sake. It at least won't hurt me as bad as Muraki or those people I loathe to call my parents."

'It'll be worse,' Tsuzuki thought unguardedly, and Hisoka heard it. A moment of sudden nerves prevented him from inquiring further.

"Can you show me how to do that?" Hisoka asked after a very long moment of silence. Tsuzuki had returned to diligently trying to ignore Hisoka's presence.

"What?"

"What you're doing. I've only ever played around with a loom when I was little; I never learned how to make something like that."

"I don't think you have the patience for this," Tsuzuki said, allowing an amused snort.

"Try me."

Tsuzuki felt a sudden pressure on his side. Hisoka had teleported next to him, leaning halfway against and halfway in front of Tsuzuki, his fingers reaching out to toy with the yarn like a cat would.

"It's…here." Tsuzuki clumsily wrapped his left arm around Hisoka, stringing the yarn through Hisoka's fingers. His right hand tried to maneuver Hisoka's around the crochet hook. "All right, you're going to want to push this hook through the first stitch."

"Okay." Hisoka stared as Tsuzuki guided his hand through the motions.

"Wrap the yarn around the hook…you have to hold the string tight." He pulled on Hisoka's left hand. "Now hook that last loop and pull it through the other two." Tsuzuki bit back a smile at watching Hisoka struggle with the task, recalling his own clumsy fingers eighty years prior. "You're gonna have to do that again."

"I think you were right about that patience thing."

Tsuzuki laughed, the first real burst of mirth he'd experienced since October, before Kyoto and Touda and the absolute death of hope. In the momentary fit of joy he pressed a kiss against the side of Hisoka's neck, underneath the hinge of Hisoka's jawbone. Not thinking, he moved the next one up to Hisoka's cheek.

He wasn't expecting Hisoka to turn his head and receive the third on his lips. And suddenly Tsuzuki realized how much he had missed kissing Hisoka, holding him tightly, feeling him turn warm and shaky with affection and nervousness.

Wrapped up in memory, he wasn't aware of gently dropping the yarn and hook to the floor, leaving his arms free to wrap around Hisoka's stomach. Barely stopping for a breath he kissed Hisoka again, slowly pressuring Hisoka backwards to lie down on the sofa.

Moving lifted Hisoka's shirt up a few inches and Tsuzuki's mind disappeared at the feel of Hisoka's skin. Hisoka's hands rested on Tsuzuki's shoulders for a moment before being forced off as his shirt was pulled over his head. This wasn't a sofa, but a bed; Hisoka was tied spread eagle, and Tsuzuki lay within him and his hands were all over him; and Hisoka was calling out so happily whenever his mouth was uncovered by Tsuzuki's—

"Tsu—…Tsuzuki!"

Tsuzuki was violently thrown out of his reverie into a brick wall of self-disgusted realization. He saw himself kneeling between Hisoka's legs, holding them open with his own; saw Hisoka's wrists trapped against the armrest underneath his own left hand as his right hand clutched the hem of Hisoka's jeans. And worst, saw Hisoka's wide, confused, frightened green eyes staring up at him.

Tsuzuki stood up quickly, leaving Hisoka to dazedly watch the ceiling.


	6. He'd Seen It

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

* * *

He'd seen it. Hisoka had fucking _seen_ it. And he was about to _nail_ Hisoka on the couch just seconds ago…Jesus Christ, what the fuck was _wrong_ with him? Was a little Goddamn self-control too much to expect out of himself?

Tsuzuki barely noticed where his feet had taken him until he came in contact with an actual bed. His room. He wasn't sure if he wanted to burn this room down more so or less so than the laboratory in Kyoto.

"Tsuzuki, the hell…?"

"I think you'd better go," Tsuzuki said, refusing to look up at his partner standing in the doorway.

"No, I don't think I should." There was a long pause. Tsuzuki heard Hisoka exhale shakily, and then the door click shut. "Was that…you've thought of that before?"

"Hisoka, please, just forget it."

"Like _hell_. I don't think what I saw I can just _ignore_. What the hell is going on with you? Dammit Tsuzuki, would you please fucking _look_ at me?"

Tsuzuki's gaze flickered up. He tried to concentrate on Hisoka's face and not on the fact that Hisoka had not put his shirt back on.

"I…I get it, you know. Normal. It's normal. I'm not so fucked up as to think you're this horrible monster because you want to…want to have, have sex."

"I want to tie you down," Tsuzuki said, almost mumbling, as if correcting Hisoka.

"Tsuzuki…"

"I don't know why. I'm disgusted with myself and I can't stop _thinking_ about it. And for God's sake, Hisoka, _please_ stop trying to make me out to be better than I am! I'm _just_ like—"

"If you compare yourself to Muraki I'm going to beat the shit out of you," Hisoka snapped. "Do you give me any credit at all? I'm a God damn Empath; I _read_ emotions. I can tell who is and who isn't a fucking sadistic psychopathic pedophile." Hisoka choked on his words as if holding back a sob.

"I told you I didn't know what gave me the right to make someone do something they're terrified of doing," Tsuzuki said in a low voice.

"You couldn't make me do anything."

"I almost just _did_!"

"But you _stopped_!"

Silence.

"All I had to do was say your name and you stopped," Hisoka continued, try to calm his voice. "And that's why I'm standing here arguing with you instead of turning in my resignation. Damn it, don't you get it? Was me stalking you for this past month not enough? The _only_ thing I am really afraid of right now is you disappearing again. I've been beaten and raped and tied up with wire and chopped up with a _meat cleaver_ and none of that, fucking _none_ of that hurt as much as hearing you say you didn't want to go on anymore."

In an instant Hisoka found himself slammed against the wall, his wrists crossed and trapped behind his back, Tsuzuki's knees pinning his thighs against the wood. Dark purple eyes holding a bitter concoction of anger and fear and sorrow and frustration met his, and the gaze seemed to bore through his eyes and into his skull.

"This is what you want?" Tsuzuki demanded, his voice like iron at its melting point. He brought one of his hands out from behind Hisoka's back and let it rest heavily around Hisoka's neck. "You want to hurt like that again?" The words were trying to stick inside his throat. "You want _me_ to hurt you like that again?"

The light contracted in Hisoka's eyes and Tsuzuki didn't try to block his thoughts. He wanted Hisoka to explore the entire black fantasy. Hisoka yanked one of his hands free and grabbed Tsuzuki's arm and Tsuzuki waited breathlessly. He wanted to feel Hisoka shoving him away, to hear Hisoka screaming that there was a monster here needing to be disposed of.

Hisoka's hand shot up to the back of Tsuzuki's head and brought it down so that his mouth was next to Tsuzuki's ear.

"N-no…" Hisoka said, his voice hushed, unsteady. He swallowed. "Because it won't be like that."

Tsuzuki could feel Hisoka's pulse pounding like a frightened rabbit's. Tsuzuki shifted his weight, taking his knees away from Hisoka's legs and freeing his head from Hisoka's hold. In agony Tsuzuki took his hands away from his partner only to let them pull Hisoka closely to him. Hisoka trembled violently in his hold.

"I'm sorry. I love you. I'm so sorry…"

Tsuzuki released him and stumbled back. His knees finally gave out and he sat down, hard, on his bed. Hisoka remained, leaning against the wall for support. Color had long since abandoned his features.

"This can't be what you want, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said, quietly.

"I want you," Hisoka replied, his entire being shaking. He slumped to the floor, putting a hand to his forehead to try and steady himself. "You know what you are, Tsuzuki?"

Hisoka leaned over, his hand disappearing in Tsuzuki's closet. When it reemerged it held the old cardboard box Tsuzuki had hidden the week prior. Hisoka reached inside and produced one of the long strips of ripped-up linen.

"You're the difference between cloth and barbed wire."


	7. Hisoka stood up

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

**Notes:** What follows is quite possibly the most vanilla bondage scene ever created. There is also the world's longest non-run-on sentence featured herein. And I've found I use semi-colons a lot. I'm also pretty sure I wrote symbolism in here but not in any particularly good order. Sorry if this isn't great. There's one more chapter due after this one, by the way.

Many thanks to my beta ehrenyu on LJ. You have the dubious distinction of being the only person and instance I've ever asked to beta a chapter of mine. I didn't correct everything you pointed out, for various reasons (too embarrassed to change it, liked how it was written, it's porn so no one's going to be thinking about that, etc), but I hope you see some semblance of your influence.

I also apologize for the long wait…there were a lot of reasons as to why it's been a few months that I won't get into since you're probably all itching for some boy-love. But I do apologize.

* * *

Hisoka stood up after taking the rest of the strips, as well as a bottle of lubrication, in hand. A brief romp in Tsuzuki's mind told him it had been bought like the cloth had been ripped—with hardly any awareness of what was happening, and then slow-cooked in guilt, on one of the off days Hisoka had not walked unexpectedly into his life.

He knew he was shaking, and he knew it was obvious. He managed to wrap his fingers together, palms still separated by the items, trying to consolidate whatever sense of security was left in him. He took a few steps forward and accidentally locked his knee, which made him stumble forward. Tsuzuki caught him, automatically, by the elbows.

At Tsuzuki's touch Hisoka realized he was cold.

Hisoka pulled his arms back slowly, releasing the items into Tsuzuki's hands. His own, now free, hands reached out to touch Tsuzuki's head, and he pushed his Empathy into Tsuzuki's mind once more. Tsuzuki watched, tortured, as Hisoka squinted his eyes shut and grimaced. Hisoka's hands twitched and Tsuzuki pulled them forcefully away.

"It's fine," Hisoka rasped, words barely escaping his throat. "That's…I'm fine with what you want."

Tsuzuki released Hisoka's hands. Hisoka allowed them to hang in the air.

"There are two people here who want to trust you."

Hisoka shifted his weight.

"Actually, there's one person here who already does."

Tsuzuki looked up. Almost of their own will Tsuzuki's fingers drifted forward and laced themselves in with Hisoka's, gripping tightly and creating the only steady part of Hisoka's body. Hisoka steeled himself and then bent over, pressing his lips against Tsuzuki's.

They were both still for a moment, and then Tsuzuki returned the kiss, exhaling a mixture of emotions. With difficulty he disentangled his fingers from Hisoka's; they reached for and felt out a length of cloth.

Hisoka felt without seeing the cloth wrap around his wrists once before it was tied, and then Tsuzuki fumbling, gracelessly weaving the rest of the strip around Hisoka's hands and tying it again. Hisoka swayed with every tug, putting up no resistance.

Carefully Tsuzuki picked up Hisoka's arms and ducked under them, emerging with them wreathed around his neck. His hands slid up and then down Hisoka's sides to toy with the border of his jeans. Hisoka's fingers turned upwards to hide in Tsuzuki's hair, and Tsuzuki quickly unbuttoned Hisoka's pants and pulled down the rest of his clothes.

Tsuzuki's hands rested on Hisoka's hips as Hisoka gingerly stepped out of and then kicked his clothes away. The feel of Hisoka's pelvis moving against his hands sent a pang of craving through Tsuzuki. He swallowed. His fingers tightened their hold and then pulled. Physics forced Hisoka to straddle his partner's lap.

Hisoka shivered in fear battling want. His hands subconsciously played with Tsuzuki's hair while Tsuzuki hesitantly wrapped one arm around Hisoka's back to hold him steady and moved the other hand to tip Hisoka's chin up. His fingertips delicately traced imaginary curved patterns on Hisoka's neck and collarbone, and after a moment his lips replaced his fingers. His now free hand joined the other in exploring Hisoka's back.

Inadvertently Tsuzuki pulled at Hisoka's lower back. Hisoka arched and Tsuzuki's hands moved down. Hisoka sucked in a breath, a hiss, and Tsuzuki immediately began to move his hands away. Hisoka shook his head, staying Tsuzuki.

"Just…surprised. I'm okay."

Hisoka adjusted, pushing his torso closer to Tsuzuki, and haltingly tilted his head back further. After a pregnant pause Tsuzuki's tongue joined his lips in the discovery of Hisoka's neck, and his hands gently squeezed Hisoka's bottom.

Tsuzuki moved his kisses to Hisoka's collarbone and then to his shoulder, and Hisoka dropped his head forward. Tsuzuki brought one hand up along Hisoka's spine to massage his neck. Again Hisoka swayed under the pressure of Tsuzuki's fingers, feeling himself growing weaker and weaker with each passing second. He felt a small, almost buried revelry with the capitulation.

Hisoka's passivity was doing likewise for his partner, though there was no hesitancy to the pleasure Tsuzuki was experiencing. Abruptly Tsuzuki stood, and without thinking Hisoka wrapped his legs around Tsuzuki's waist and tightened his hold around Tsuzuki's neck.

Tsuzuki turned around and knelt on the bed, trying to ease Hisoka out of his arms and onto the mattress. Hisoka was reticent to let go. They could both hear and feel the frantic thumping of the other's heartbeats. Tsuzuki remembered how his heart had pounded in the fire when he was once again attacked with doubt and self-hatred, and he remembered what Hisoka had done. Tsuzuki pulled his head back and kissed Hisoka's lips, allowing the gesture to linger chastely.

When Tsuzuki opened his eyes he watched Hisoka seemingly sink into the mattress and pillow. His ironclad hold around Tsuzuki's neck loosened to where Tsuzuki knew he could easily free himself from it. Full comprehension of reality smacked him like a brick to the face. Hisoka was allowing his beloved nightmare to happen.

Swallowing, Tsuzuki ducked out from under Hisoka's arms and reached for two more strips of ripped-up linen left by the pillow. He crawled backwards and wrapped his hands around Hisoka's waist. Hisoka willed his body to be weightless and let Tsuzuki pull him further down the mattress. Tsuzuki's hands slipped underneath Hisoka and slid down to his ankles as he stepped backwards off the bed. Hisoka bit his lip as Tsuzuki lifted his legs off the mattress, bent them, and then spread them, placing them against the outsides of the two posts on either side of the foot of the bed. Quickly, shamefacedly, Tsuzuki wrapped the two strips of cloth around Hisoka's ankles, tying them to their respective posts.

Gingerly Tsuzuki knelt back on the bed, between Hisoka's legs. Hisoka's fingers were closed into tight fists to ward off the shaking. As if handling already cracked porcelain Tsuzuki lifted Hisoka's arms and placed them on the mattress over his head. He picked up the last, longer strip of cloth, tied one end around Hisoka's wrists, and then leaned forward to knot the other end around one of the decorative rungs of the headboard.

Tsuzuki's fingers burrowed between and underneath Hisoka's and uncurled them. His fingertips danced in Hisoka's palms and then lightly ran over the terrycloth and the pale undersides of Hisoka's arms. Tsuzuki watched Hisoka's face with hawk eyes, waiting for a request to stop, but nothing left Hisoka's mouth except shallow, ragged breathing. Tsuzuki's hands wandered Hisoka's body all the way down to the top half of his thighs but still no protest came.

Tsuzuki leaned forward and then down to cover Hisoka's mouth with his own. He put his right hand on the mattress near Hisoka's hip, and then pulled his free arm up to take Hisoka with his hand.

Hisoka almost broke away from Tsuzuki's mouth but stopped himself. Gathering up his nerves he instead lifted his head, trying to return the kiss. His body shifted slightly but the newness of the situation kept him mostly still. He'd been waiting for cold hands; waiting for his lips to be swollen and ripped and bleeding. The sensation was unfamiliar. There was warmth, and pressure; a rhythmic beating, like a pulse. It probably mirrored his real pulse, he vaguely mused, but any attempt to articulate the thought translated into almost content sighs into Tsuzuki's mouth. A soft tingling feeling ran through Hisoka's legs and pelvis. The pulse was growing more insistent, even as Tsuzuki's touch slowed and then ceased altogether. Hisoka's eyes just barely opened to see Tsuzuki smile weakly at him.

"It might help if I got undressed, too."

Again Tsuzuki slipped backwards off the bed, and he almost stumbled when his feet hit the floor. He leaned heavily against the wall, needing support. It was becoming painful to keep his clothes on. He quickly rectified that situation and straightened up, trying to get a handle on his breathing. Swaying slightly, he rested his hands atop the posts at the foot of the bed, fingertips brushing Hisoka's toes.

"Your feet are freezing," Tsuzuki said, moving to warm them with friction from his hands.

"It's kinda _December_," Hisoka said, and his sarcasm made everything surreally normal. "Don't you have heating?"

"I think they turned it off."

"You're so irresponsible…pay your damn bills, Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki laughed, and he thought he heard Hisoka unsuccessfully trying to swallow his own amusement. Hisoka's laughter was a rare diamond: beautiful and attention-grabbing. The uncommon sound brought Tsuzuki's focus at once to Hisoka's face, and from there, Hisoka's entire body.

Without thought and with surprising deftness, Tsuzuki unbuckled his watch and let it fall to the floor. He bent slightly and pressed his lips against Hisoka's calf. Hisoka shifted his leg, towards Tsuzuki's face, and Tsuzuki kissed his way down Hisoka's leg, before moving to his hip and then jumping up towards his neck, on the other side of his body. Through half-open eyes Tsuzuki watched his own hand travel across Hisoka to retrieve the bottle of lubrication. He turned his face, almost as if hiding it in shame, and returned to, now slowly, kissing Hisoka's neck. He felt Hisoka's breathing begin to pick up depth and steady speed.

Without looking he flipped open the bottle's lid and managed to squeeze out the contents with his thumb and small finger onto his three middle ones. His free right hand slipped underneath and around Hisoka's head and gently pushed it so Hisoka faced him. His left hand moved lower. He felt Hisoka twitch when one finger pressed against him; Tsuzuki steeled himself and continued applying pressure until he pushed inside.

Hisoka sucked in a hiss, grimacing. Unconsciously he began to pull back but stopped at the feel of Tsuzuki's right hand tightening its hold on him. Slightly opening his squinted-shut eyes he saw Tsuzuki's face begin to drain of color.

"I'm fine," Hisoka said, his voice wandering in and out of a whisper.

Tsuzuki bit his lip. After a moment, he began to move his finger. Hisoka chewed on the fleshy inside of his cheek, trying to distract himself from the pain, trying to remember the borrowed fantasy in which he enjoyed this. He switched to biting his tongue when Tsuzuki managed to push in a second finger, teeth bearing down to where Hisoka feared he might draw blood.

Blood…

"Ow! Ow…"

Tsuzuki arrested his movement. A third finger, bent painfully for both of them, was halfway inside Hisoka. What felt like an hour passed before Hisoka mumbled his permission, and Tsuzuki gritted his teeth and straightened his finger. Hisoka blanched, and desperately swallowed any further noises of pain. He turned his head, burying his face in Tsuzuki's palm and the warm comfort offered there. Another half-involuntary movement made his lips brush against the scars on Tsuzuki's wrist.

They paused.

Hisoka remembered seeing Tsuzuki in the church.

Tsuzuki felt a very purposeful kiss to his unhealed skin. Releasing the breath he'd been holding, he carefully pulled his fingers out of Hisoka. Gracelessly he managed to apply the lubrication to himself one-handedly, not wanting to move his other hand way from Hisoka's face. Discarding the bottle, he allowed his free hand to wander the expanse between Hisoka's hips and knees.

Hisoka was beginning to open his mouth against Tsuzuki's wrist, making small noises that vibrated through his skin. Reluctantly Tsuzuki moved his hand away to support himself as he pushed himself up, but Hisoka doggedly followed, leaning his face across his own arm to wrap his mouth around Tsuzuki's wrist. His tongue rested on the scars; his lips pressed down on Tsuzuki's skin in a hold akin to a baby's on a finger.

Tsuzuki slid his left hand underneath Hisoka's lower back and gently pushed it up. Hisoka's eyelids wrinkled as he shut his eyes tightly.

"Hisoka?"

Hisoka nodded awkwardly, not letting go of Tsuzuki's wrist.

"Are…you're sure?"

Hisoka nodded again, quicker this time and again refusing to relinquish his hold. Tsuzuki took a breath to steady himself. He steeled his fingers, and slowly, almost agonizingly, entered his partner.

Hisoka pushed his tongue against Tsuzuki's scars, determinedly trying to keep his mind on licking those wounds instead of remembering his own. His Empathy was like a shaken bottle of soda, kept inside only by a tight lid of will. To let it go free would mean to see an eight-year-old beaten senseless, too much like his own memory that he was trying to bury.

"Okay…okay, give it a moment," Tsuzuki said breathily, watching Hisoka trembling, indecipherable noises living and dying in his throat. "Are you okay? I'm not hurting you, right?"

Hisoka hesitated for a split second and then just barely shook his head, keeping his mouth on Tsuzuki's wrist. Tsuzuki lightly drummed his fingers against Hisoka's back, trying not to move, trying not to comprehend how incredibly sexy Hisoka was at the moment.

It had been like that from the beginning. It wasn't that he'd ever _not_ been attracted to Hisoka. But when Hisoka almost cried in Nagasaki, Tsuzuki had had to consciously refrain from doing more than just touching his head. When Hisoka hid his bloody and tear-stained face in Tsuzuki's shirt as the Queen Camellia sank to the bottom of the East China Sea, Tsuzuki held him past the time he finally cried himself to sleep, and only relinquished him when the helicopter landed in Taiwan and they teleported back to Meifu; crossing dimensions woke Hisoka, who took himself back to his house alone. When Hisoka sobbed and begged Tsuzuki not to leave him in Kyoto, Tatsumi pulled them out of the flames clinging to each other and kissing, bordering on oblivious to everything around them.

An almost imperceptible shift in the body beneath him took Tsuzuki's attention outward. Unwittingly he hadn't been guarding his thoughts, and the sheer force of them had managed to slip through the cracks of Hisoka's barriers. Hisoka could feel very distinct wet drops cascading out of his eyes; the kind of thick, smooth tears that run when no attempt has been made to hold them back.

Tsuzuki met his partner's gaze and suddenly it was there: the truth, this locked room containing their individual and intertwining salvations. The terrifying and wonderful trust Hisoka had given him was like the key, sitting in his hand as his fingers curled into his palm to toy with it, as he watched it turn from brass to gold with every passing day, month…second.

Tsuzuki pulled his left hand out from underneath Hisoka to gently touch his partner's face and wipe away the tears.

"Do you want to stop?" he asked quietly.

Hisoka moved, hesitated, and then finally pulled his mouth away from Tsuzuki's wrist.

"No."

Tsuzuki's hand slipped down Hisoka's face, turned to let his fingertips brush Hisoka's neck, and then traveled down his chest and stomach before again disappearing underneath Hisoka to once more slightly push him up. Taking a steadying breath, Tsuzuki gently thrust forward.

Hisoka shifted, pulling at the length of cloth tethering his wrists to the headboard. He stared up at Tsuzuki, continuing to cry soundlessly. His vision was blurring and the loss of sight heightened his sense of being penetrated…and comforted. What felt like consolation was emanating from Tsuzuki and that was enough to bring back the soft and insistent tingling now spreading throughout most of his body, intensified with every light press of Tsuzuki's fingers into his back, with every slow and careful push into him.

After a moment Tsuzuki drew his hands out from underneath Hisoka and let them rest on Hisoka's hips. The wish that he couldn't see the bones protruding against Hisoka's skin was twinned by the thought that this was better than he'd unwillingly imagined; the feel of Hisoka's pelvis pushing up against his hands, Hisoka's legs tensing and pressing against him and then relaxing in time with Tsuzuki's movements.

His hands wrapped around Hisoka's hips and gently lifted them up. Slowly, methodically, he began to alternate between pulling his partner towards him and again pushing into Hisoka.

In a hazy consciousness Hisoka threw his head back, dimly grateful that it was a mattress instead of a headstone his head slammed into. His body was arching up, smoothly, easily; his spine wasn't twisting and his legs were supported—

'Fucking _stop thinking about that!_' Hisoka mentally screamed at himself, never more grateful that it was he and not Tsuzuki who was an Empath. Even through his barriers he could feel the first real genuine happiness since Kyoto, and the most intense he'd ever felt, radiating from Tsuzuki. It was without question the most beautiful thing he had ever experienced and so he tried to force his suddenly stiff muscles to relax. It had made everything worse…he had sensed that underneath the perverse enjoyment the fucker had been just as miserable as him and—

Hisoka managed to hear a pleasured shudder from Tsuzuki; there was a sudden rush of borrowed heat in and on his body. Present threw handfuls of dirt into the hole that past lay in.

This was okay. Purple outshone silver. Hisoka's eyes were closed and he trusted that it was _Tsuzuki's_ hoarse voice pleading "Wider", and that was okay because a question mark hid at the end; Hisoka's hips were his own to adjust even with his ankles held fast, and this way he could make himself believe his entire pelvis had emptied out and it was only Tsuzuki there, thrusting up inside him. He could be Tsuzuki's.

He could be Hisoka's, too.

He was still crying. He could feel it at the corners of his lips when they turned up, even before he opened his eyes to find his vision was obscured by water.

It was the smile decorated with tears that pushed Tsuzuki towards the edge. The inside of his lower lip lay caught between his teeth as he tried to hold himself back, wanting more for Hisoka, wishing that realized dreams acknowledged time. The one thing that had kept him sane since his fantasies started was the thought of Hisoka climaxing first; the mental images tapered off after that, leaving only the feelings. He cursed his haste. He hadn't been thinking; he never _was_ thinking when it came to Hisoka.

He started moving faster, more desperately, and instantly regretted it when Hisoka whimpered, so quietly. So small. The little cry flew into his heart like a rock into a window; the shattered glass seemed to stab the back of his eyes and he wanted to dissolve into bloody tears.

"It's okay, I'm fine," Hisoka whispered hurriedly. "Just…fast, too fast."

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Don't be."

"I never want to hear that. You have to stop me before it gets to that."

"God damn it Tsuzuki, please, don't…" Hisoka heard it through the cracks of his mental barriers, buried in the recesses of Tsuzuki's memory. "So exceeding sweet is this greatest of pains…"

"Hisoka?"

"It is impossible…" Hisoka's eyes filled in with their normal green as he regained his handle on his Empathy "…to desire to be rid of it…"

Hisoka's thighs, replacing his restrained arms, had been pressed tightly against Tsuzuki's sides, like an embrace. Tsuzuki felt his partner's muscles slacken.

"I thought he thrust several times," Hisoka recited, and took a shuddery breath, "into my heart…"

Before Tsuzuki knew what was happening Hisoka's body pushed forward into him, and he couldn't stop himself. It felt like those few minutes in Heaven, his burden taken away and relief saturating him, the excess sense of release enveloping him. His head tilted back, trapping the cry in his throat, as after what had felt like years of waiting he finally came inside his partner.

'…leaving me all on fire with a wondrous love…'

Tears and sweat glistened on Hisoka's dark pink face, grimacing as Tsuzuki silently pulled out of him. His lips were parted as he gulped down air. He'd only felt some small fraction of Tsuzuki's orgasm and the rush of _feelings_ knocked the wind out of him; as his body constricted in pleasure it felt as though his lungs were following suite.

He forgot the pain in his chest and his eyes came into focus when he felt something wet fall onto his cheek. Tsuzuki's shining violet eyes stared down at him; another tear fell from them onto Hisoka lip and rolled into his mouth.

"Why did you do that?" Tsuzuki choked out, closing his eyes, and his hands on Hisoka's hips tightened their hold. "I wanted you to…I didn't want to go first, I—"

Hisoka coughed, and in doing so cleared his throat enough to allow inhalation. "I wanted us…_you_ to see something," he breathed in a rush.

"What could you—"

"Tsuzuki." Hisoka's tone made Tsuzuki open his eyes. "You…" Hisoka's legs gently squeezed Tsuzuki's sides—he ignored the pain wrought by moving—and he shifted his weight so his left hipbone moved in Tsuzuki's hand. He glanced up into Tsuzuki's face with half-lidded eyes. "Please…"

Tsuzuki blinked, squinting his eyes shut as he did and forcing out the last tears. "I understand."

His left hand moved to gently brush against Hisoka's face, and then descended to take him again.

Hisoka made a small, vindicated noise.

Eyes closed and Empathy controlled, Hisoka lifted his head to meet the kiss he knew was coming, the kiss that felt like resuscitation. Tsuzuki breathed into him and his aching lungs started to fill with balmy air.

Tsuzuki kissed Hisoka's eyelids, one and then the other, and then leaned up, tracing his lips and the tip of his tongue over Hisoka's fingertips, before moving to the palm whose wrist lay atop the other. His right hand wrapped around the back of Hisoka's head while his left continued its work.

Hisoka's fingers pressed into Tsuzuki's face as if holding it. His own face was buried in Tsuzuki's shoulder; his open mouth tasted damp skin as he gave up trying to control his breathing. He felt his body trying to curl up, just like…no. Not just like. Not in defense. There was no need to protect himself. It felt like waves crashing against and at the same time being absorbed into sand, and it was near impossible to tell who was liquid and who solid because Tsuzuki was doing the same, and they were protecting each other. Tsuzuki reared up to look at him, and all thoughts of the man who'd been there previously disappeared. For this moment only, it was like those thoughts never existed.

Tsuzuki wondered if somehow he had taken Hisoka's Empathy, because feeling and seeing Hisoka climax—Hisoka, hands bound and fingers slightly bent above his head, legs spread and held wide and relaxed, peace on his face for the first time Tsuzuki could remember—brought him to orgasm again.

For a long time after he simply stared at his partner, wanting to tattoo the image of Hisoka lying secure in surrender as if wrapped in a favorite blanket over the scarred skin of most of his memories.

When Hisoka's body began to tremble Tsuzuki once more slipped backwards off the bed. His fingers felt slightly numb as they tugged at the knots holding Hisoka's ankles to the bedposts and then moved against the mattress as Tsuzuki crawled back over Hisoka to untie his hands. Tsuzuki held his partner's freed wrists for a moment, and then pulled them up. Hisoka moved with them, sitting up as Tsuzuki pressed his lips against the pink, slightly chafed skin. Hisoka watched him, silently pulling his legs closer to him so his knees were pushed up in the air.

"You look tired," Tsuzuki said in a hushed voice, glancing up at Hisoka's face. The tears had stopped running since they had finished, but the green eyes were still watery and shaking against a pale face. "Do you…want to sleep or…?"

"Not until I…" Hisoka tried to wrench the words up into his mouth as the blissful state of forgetfulness ruthlessly abandoned him. "I want…I want a bath."

"…What?"

"I couldn't…couldn't…" Hisoka tucked his legs close to his body so he could turn and plant his feet on the floor. "My head got slammed…I woke up in the basement. I couldn't walk for two days, I didn't get to…I wanted, I _want_ him off me, completely."

"I don't think you'll get any hot water," Tsuzuki said in a low, controlled tone, hands shaking as he resisted the urge to put his fist through a wall.

"Thanks for telling me," Hisoka said, his voice a wisp of sound as he bore himself out of the bedroom.

Tsuzuki sat still for a long moment, until he faintly heard the sound of water filling the bathtub cease. He stood up suddenly, going to the closet to throw on some pajamas, and turned to almost viciously pull the bedclothes into his arms. Even the pillowcases were removed. His purge of memories from the house hadn't yet reached the bed; it was high time the sheets were laundered and replaced anyway. His energy astonished him as he picked their clothes off the floor and added them to the pile in his arms.

On his way through the living room to the utility room he saw Hisoka's shirt and the blanket lying surprisingly neatly on the floor. The shirt was quickly added to the misshapen stack and discarded in the washing machine with the rest, and back Tsuzuki went to the living room.

For a handful of seconds—it felt like much longer—Tsuzuki stared at his neglected project, the pet that he allowed to stray until he missed it. And then with slow deliberation he went forward, bent to pick it up, and sat back down on his sofa, as he had hours ago. He held it up, assessing its size. Despite his erratic work on it, once a few more rows were completed it would be large enough to pass as an actual blanket. It would be smaller than what he had originally planned, but then, Ruka had been taller, even than himself.

He worked until he heard the loud buzz of the washing machine signaling it was time to put the clothes and sheets into the dryer; fortunately it coincided with the completion of a row.

He went back up to the bedroom before entering the bathroom. The bathtub was drained and a dry Hisoka sat curled up on the toilet, looking down at his wrists and ankles, his face betraying a mix of relief, disturbance, and incredulity.

"That was quick," Tsuzuki murmured.

"I didn't need to do much."

"Are you okay?" Tsuzuki asked, softly brushing his hand up Hisoka's spine.

"I don't know." Hisoka looked up at him. "I think so."

Tsuzuki knelt in front of Hisoka to look up into his eyes. "Do you want to go back home?"

Hisoka exhaled heavily, shakily. "I'm here already."

Tsuzuki blinked. There was a knot in his throat now, one without spikes ripping out his innards. He stood, and Hisoka moved his legs far enough for Tsuzuki to slip his arm under them; his other arm supported Hisoka's back as he picked his partner up and carried him out of the bathroom.

"Your clothes are in the dryer, with the sheets," Tsuzuki said as they walked into the bedroom. "There's probably something of mine you can wear."

Hisoka's eyes took in the scene before him. The mattress lay undressed, looking raw and exposed. Even the pillows were vulnerable in their nakedness. Only a messily laid yellow blanket interrupted the empty, forlorn whiteness of the bed.

"I'll be fine with just that."

"You won't be cold?" Tsuzuki asked, surprised.

Hisoka shook his head. Tsuzuki opened his mouth to protest but thought better of it—arguing at this point in time was not wise, he figured—and went forward to set Hisoka on the bed. He picked up the blanket and wrapped it around Hisoka, nigh unto swaddling him in it, and gently pressured him to lie down.

"_You're_ not going to be cold?" Hisoka asked, watching Tsuzuki crawl over him to lie on the other side of the bed.

"I've slept without heating before," Tsuzuki said, smiling weakly. "And what I've got on is pretty warm."

"Is this big enough for two people?"

"Not wide enough. I meant for it to be for only one person."

Hisoka frowned slightly and from within his little cocoon of yarn he fingered the blanket. He looked up again when he felt Tsuzuki's arm fall across his side.

"Do what you want," Hisoka said when he felt the arm twitch and hesitate. Tsuzuki coughed out a nervous chuckle and pulled Hisoka close to him. It was odd feeling the yarn he had worked for seventy years thick and patterned into something viable.

"I told you that you couldn't hurt me."


	8. He Hadn't Expected to Wake

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Yami no Matsuei

**Notes:** This has been a long time coming, and has undergone a lot of rewrites and reimagining. I hope the end product is a satisfying conclusion to Cloth and Barbed Wire. Thank you very much for your patience! Please, enjoy.

* * *

He hadn't expected to wake before the afternoon, but the misty gray light of early morning greeted Tsuzuki's groggily opening eyes. Or rather, it would have, had he not woken up to the pale skin of Hisoka's face contrasting his sandy blond hair and the yellow of the blanket.

It took a moment for full memory to set in.

Tsuzuki brought his hand up to let his fingertips lightly brush Hisoka's face, letting touch cement the reality of Hisoka being there. He pulled his hand away when Hisoka stirred, but too late: Hisoka's eyes had already blinked open, and then blinked away the momentary shock that sleepy forgetfulness created. He moved his hand to wipe at his eyes, giving a tiny groan as he did so.

"You okay?" Tsuzuki asked, a bit anxiously.

Hisoka twitched his forearm, still encased in blanket. "Arms're sore," he mumbled tiredly.

Tsuzuki slipped his hand down the blanket and lifted it away, exposing one of the arms in question to the open air. His fingers settled against Hisoka's skin and began to attempt a massage. "I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it," Hisoka said, his voice gently dismissive.

Tsuzuki shifted his way closer against Hisoka and curled up slightly. "So I guess it wasn't a dream this time."

"It was real enough from my end."

Tsuzuki finally let his hand rest, giving his concentration fully to looking Hisoka in the eyes. "Do you…wish it hadn't happened?"

"No, I'm…I'm glad it did." Hisoka shifted his arm nervously; his fingers brushed against Tsuzuki's arm and lightly landed there. He was suddenly aware of how close his face was to Tsuzuki's; a slight movement gently touched their noses together. After a moment of pause Tsuzuki deliberately repeated the gesture and then pushed a little further; his hand left Hisoka's arm to tilt Hisoka's chin up and make it easier to press their lips together. He felt Hisoka's leg bend underneath the blanket, but before that could create a distance between them he swung his own leg over Hisoka's. They turned, half unconsciously and half of their own accord; Hisoka rolled onto his back with Tsuzuki on top of him. His pulse picked up a little as Tsuzuki transferred to Hisoka's neck; Tsuzuki must have felt it because he relaxed, lying down atop Hisoka, resting his head on Hisoka's collar and somehow wriggling his hands underneath the trunk of Hisoka's body.

"Sorry," they mumbled simultaneously, and Tsuzuki had to snort some facsimile of amusement at in tandem speech.

"Don't you have something to do today?" Hisoka asked quietly.

"Do I?" Tsuzuki picked his head up, balancing his chin on Hisoka's collarbone.

"'S'the twenty-fifth. Isn't that some major holiday of yours…?"

Tsuzuki made a face. "Main event's at midnight. I…kinda missed it. There's a mass in the morning, though."

"And there's still that angel waiting for you. Might show itself to you this time."

"Would you want to come wi—" But Hisoka's eyes had already given up the fight to stay open, and the deep, even pace of his breathing told Tsuzuki he was not interested in staying awake. "I should probably do it alone, anyway." He went up on his hands and knees, still not wanting to tear his eyes away from his half-asleep partner. "Hisoka?"

"Nn?"

"Will you be _okay_ if I leave?"

"…Yeah," Hisoka said, tentatively. "I'll be fine."

"I'll stay if you want me to."

"No, you should go take care of this."

"Are you su—"

"_Yes_." Hisoka's brow had knitted, indicating a growing headache made from lack of sleep.

"Okay," Tsuzuki relented, lowering his voice so as to not assault Hisoka's ears and brain with it. The will to get off the mattress was reluctant to assert itself, but Tsuzuki managed to force himself to clamber out of bed, somehow not kicking Hisoka on the way out.

True to form the water was freezing when he stepped inside the shower, but he had long since acclimated himself to his temperamental piping. A quick glance around the stall let him note that Hisoka had thoughtfully, or at least compulsively, arranged the items in the show into some semblance of neatness. He _had_ spent a long time in the bathroom last night…

An unsettled feeling came over him at the thought of Hisoka sitting in the water as it grew even colder, maybe scrubbing his skin off or contemplating drowning or…no. No. He couldn't induce those feelings in Hisoka. Hisoka said so, said that Tsuzuki couldn't hurt him—

Against his will Tsuzuki rushed through the shower and back to his room, the anxiousness he hadn't felt building up in his stomach mitigating upon seeing Hisoka still there, curled up tightly under the yellow blanket, asleep.

Briefly he contemplated staying, a thought process that ended when he remembered Hisoka's insistence that he should meet whomever was waiting for him at St. Mary's. Besides—he couldn't stop himself from thinking—if Hisoka wanted to leave, he didn't want to be around to prevent him.

* * *

It was earlier than he had thought. A quick glance informed him that even the priest wasn't yet there to prepare the church for Mass.

He'd been sitting for a few silent minutes before he felt something that he thought was akin to what Hisoka felt with his Empathy: some sort of presence with emotions emanating off it, nudging at the shores of his mind. It took a few more moments for intuition to turn into certainty, and for color and form to fill in the spirit lightly bumping into him.

"You were waiting for me to have sex with my partner?"

The wild, heartfelt laugh had not been changed by over seven decades and dimensional boundaries. "I was waiting for you to do something that would make you happy, Otouto. I didn't know about the sex yet, though. Way to kiss and tell."

"You didn't?"

"There's only so much I can do in the lower dimensions. In Heaven I can siphon off a part of myself and let it follow you around—which I've done, by the way—but there's a whole different set of rules here. Lack of remote viewing, for one thing. Besides, do you really want me tailing you everywhere?"

"Honestly Ruka-nee, it would have been nice to see you."

"I think you wouldn't have believed it was really me," Ruka said, more resignedly than accusingly.

"Yeah…illusions are occupational hazards."

"Moreover you wouldn't think that I'd bother showing up." Tsuzuki felt warmth settle atop his hand. "I'm sorry, Otouto. I really thought the Shinigami post would help you."

"I don't blame you."

"Yes…you're still reserving all the blame for yourself, we've noticed. Mom wants me to tell you to stop it. She'd tell you herself, but the one you always listened to was _me_. She also wants me to tell you that she misses you like hell, by the way."

"Tell her…tell her the feeling's mutual," Tsuzuki said, with difficulty. A few seconds of comfortable quiet passed. "Ruka?"

"Hmm?"

"Is this it?"

"Is this what?"

"You said you would send me a sign when I was ready to join you. I think this goes a bit above and beyond a sign, but…"

Ruka sighed. "It hasn't even been two months."

"What hasn't…? Oh." Tsuzuki suddenly tensed at the thought of Kyoto.

"I think that if I took you there now you would be just as miserable as when you first died. Maybe more so." Ruka surveyed her younger brother's crushed expression. "You know, Otouto, it doesn't reflect badly on you to not be in Heaven. People _do_ leave it, after all. Dad did."

"He what?"

"Yeah, he reincarnated awhile ago. But that's my point. Heaven's…you go when you're ready for it and you leave when you want to go somewhere else. It's not some ultimate final destination. You're not a shitty despicable worm doomed to fry in Hell, Otouto. You've just got something here that makes it so you can't rest until it's taken care of. Or _someone_, as the case is now." Ruka cleared her throat. "As much as it pains me to concede that I'm no longer the center of the universe in your eyes, I don't think you should wait on me telling you you're ready for Heaven anymore. That's something you and him should decide."

"You put an awful lot of stock in my relationship with Hisoka," was the only thing Tsuzuki was able to force himself to say.

"Even if I didn't have remote viewing in Heaven…and even if I hadn't seen your exchange a week ago…I know how you love someone, Asato. And it's hard to walk away from something like that, especially if you don't have a reason to."

Ruka cut him off before he could even open his mouth. "He _doesn't have a reason to_, Otouto. I don't know how you manage to throw your whole being into hating yourself and loving someone else at the same time, but somehow you do it, and it's always driven me nuts. More importantly it's driven _you_ nuts, literally, and maybe this time you'll believe me when I tell you that you _don't deserve that_."

At first she began to despair, as his usual silence buried her younger brother's voice underneath it. Then she noticed that, for the first time in the hundred years she'd been his sister, the light in his eyes was neither due to tears nor mania.

"I think…" Tsuzuki said, each word painstakingly extricating itself from the self-loathing it had been stuck inside, "that I might enjoy Mass today."

A swell of euphoria that she hadn't experienced since entering Heaven welled up inside Ruka's chest. "Or at least finally pay attention," she teased.

Tsuzuki laughed. "Yeah, I don't think the whole attention-span-of-a-goldfish thing is gonna go away anytime soon."

"I don't think I'd recognize you if it did," Ruka said, now giggling as well. "Hopefully you didn't employ that particular character trait with your partner during what I'm presuming was last night…?"

"_Ruka!_"

"Sorry, couldn't resist," Ruka said, between laughs. "That's what older siblings are for, right?"

"We're in a _church_," Tsuzuki continued, not sure if he was horrified or amused at her irreverence.

"Bad me," she said, lightly smacking her hand. "I suppose I'll leave before I offend again…"

"Wait."

Ruka's joking manner melted away at her the earnestness in her brother's tone; she turned back towards him from pretending to start to leave.

"Will you stay?" Tsuzuki asked, sounding and feeling like the child Ruka had always seen him as. "Just for Mass, at least?"

"Of course." Ruka settled back in the pew, the corner of her mouth turned up almost sadly. "I'd stay longer, but I'm not going to keep you. It's far too easy to be distracted by my fabulousness, and you've got someone to go back to now."

Later, halfway through Mass, Tsuzuki remembered what she said, and was surprised that he hadn't thought to counter that with the supposition that Hisoka wouldn't be there to return to.

* * *

Tsuzuki walked back inside his house to the sound of dishes clinking together underneath running water. He shook his shoes off as noiselessly as possible and stole into the kitchen. Hisoka stood at the sink, elbows resting against the counter as he determinedly scrubbed a plate, small yellow pieces of sponge ripping off and decorating the bottom of the sink. The dish rack was already filled with the plates and utensils Tsuzuki had left lying around the kitchen, which itself seemed somewhat neater, even with the boxes of memories he had yet to put back in the attic still stacked on the kitchen table.

"I put the laundry away," Hisoka said, not turning his head.

"And scoured my kitchen, from the looks of it," Tsuzuki said good-humoredly.

"It needed it, and I had the time." Hisoka, finally satisfied with the plate, placed it in the disk rack and turned off the faucet.

"Yeah, sorry about that. I got there early and it ran pretty long." Tsuzuki somewhat quickly crossed to the stove and pulled a hand towel off the oven door handle, handing it to Hisoka once he had finished shaking excess water from his hands into the sink.

"Thanks," Hisoka said, taking the towel. "And don't worry about it. It gave me enough time to go out."

"You…went out?"

Hisoka jerked his head in the direction of the table. Tsuzuki glanced in the direction Hisoka had indicated; nestled snugly between two boxes was what looked, from the side, like a picture frame. Tsuzuki glanced at Hisoka, perplexed, before crossing the room and extricating the item from the boxes.

"My family didn't do Christmas at all," Hisoka continued as Tsuzuki did so, "and I didn't know that you celebrated it, so I didn't have anything prepared…frame was a bitch to find; damn near everything is closed."

"What is it?" Tsuzuki asked, looking back at Hisoka as he finally managed to wriggle it from its cardboard prison.

"Calligraphy. Kinda. You had a fountain pen and some blank paper lying around."

"You know calligraphy?"

"I _am_ the heir to a traditional family. But this is nothing spectacular; I just slapped it together while you were at church."

Tsuzuki glanced down at the frame in his hand, turning it over so the glass, shielding a poem, faced him. Hisoka's handwriting was small and almost box-like; even the flowing lines of the characters couldn't escape the regimented, disciplined way he used his hand.

""April is the cruelest month, breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain"," Tsuzuki read aloud. His mind skipped, bittersweet, back two years before. ""Winter kept us warm, covering Earth in forgetful snow, feeding a little life with dried tubers"." He looked up. "What is this?"

"Part of a T.S. Eliot poem. American. I don't just _hide out_ in the library, you know. I actually read." He paused. "I was never a huge fan of the springtime. The temptation to escape for a few minutes was too great. There was no way I could walk the mountains without killing myself, but I'd want to be outside…winter made the basement feel like a home."

"What about now?"

Hisoka looked off into space and shrugged tightly. "April is okay now, but I still prefer December."

Tsuzuki gently placed the frame atop one of the boxes. "I'm getting pretty fond of the month, too." He smiled. "Thank you, Hisoka. I love it."

"Thought you'd appreciate the gardening metaphors."

"I do. Though I don't know if I should or shouldn't plant lilacs this spring now."

"I think he advises against it."

"Mums are nicer to look at, anyway." Tsuzuki picked the frame up again and read through the lines again, savoring seeing Hisoka's handwriting on something other than an official report. "I'm gonna find a place for this."

Easier said than done. Even if the living room had been totally cleaned up, Tsuzuki couldn't imagine a place for the poem to go. The kitchen was a perpetual disaster area, so that was out, and the bathroom didn't seem at all appropriate. He wandered the expanse of his house slowly, running the list of possible locations in his head, until he trailed distractedly into the bedroom and was confronted by the only place that seemed at all like it would be a home for the gift.

"Did you see her?" Hisoka's voice floated in from the doorway as he watched Tsuzuki delicately place the frame next to the Maria Kannon, the only keepsake of his mother's that he couldn't bear to ignore.

Tsuzuki shook his head. "It was my sister. But she told me that…that Mom is worried about me, and she…misses m—" The words fell out of his throat and back into his heart. After a few moments of silence he heard the floorboards creak underneath Hisoka's feet, and then felt Hisoka tentatively leaning against his back, head resting between his hands.

"Thank you, for making me go today," Tsuzuki managed to choke out. "It was…" He squinted his eyes shut and tilted his head back. "I needed to see her again. I needed my sister."

Hisoka straightened up, his hands sliding down Tsuzuki's back as he did so, and stepped back. "I'm glad you got the chance to," he said, and Tsuzuki heard the knot in Hisoka's throat. "Are you going to see her again, after today?"

"We might meet each other in the church every once in awhile, when I decide to go. She said that she didn't come earlier because she knew I wouldn't think that it'd really be her…she was right, but now…now I think that I can. Believe it, I mean."

Other fragments of their conversation floated in his mind and suddenly Tsuzuki realized how loaded Hisoka's question had been.

"She told me not to depend on her to tell me when I was ready to move on to Heaven." The sense of relief emanating off Hisoka could not have been clearer had Tsuzuki been the one with Empathy. "She said…she said that's something you and I should agree upon."

"So she knows, I take it."

"Yeah," Tsuzuki said, with difficulty, after a moment. "I thought she already knew, so I mentioned it. I'm sorry; you probably didn't want me to say anything…"

"It wasn't a crime. I'm not ashamed of it."

Tsuzuki turned around. Hisoka seemed to be determinedly staring at the wall the head of the bed was pressed up against, until Tsuzuki followed his gaze more strictly and saw it directed at the strip of linen still tied, if somewhat neatly rolled, to the headboard despite the rest of the bed having been made. Next to the pillow it rested atop sat the yellow blanket, folded and tucked into the corner, looking as though it had always belonged there.

"Did you have any plans for today?" Hisoka continued, nonchalantly.

"No, not really," Tsuzuki said. "We would have spent the whole day at church when I was alive, but I haven't done that in…well, a really long time. Some years I visit Saya. She's Christian, too, though she wasn't raised as exclusively Catholic as I was. I think she and Yuma are doing something together today, though. She said that they haven't had a proper date in awhile, and Christmas is a good time to rectify that."

Hisoka shot him a confused look. "Is it?"

"As I understand it, Christmas is more like Valentine's Day if you're not actually Catholic."

"Oh." Hisoka glanced down, sideways, anywhere but at Tsuzuki. "Did you want to do that?"

"I'm sorry?" Hisoka had spoken so quickly, Tsuzuki had momentarily thought he misheard.

"Go out. Do something together. If it's a holiday for…for lovers…" The embarrassment in Hisoka's voice was almost tangible.

"Do _you_ want to?"

"I…I'm fine with whatever you want to do. "

There it was again. Tsuzuki had never known Hisoka to be so complacent, especially not around him. He'd often taken secret pleasure in the fact that Hisoka felt close enough to him to contradict, to argue, to outright fight with him.

"You don't have to do something just because I want to, Hisoka."

"Just because you want to do it doesn't mean I don't," Hisoka shot back. "When was the last time you forced me into anything?"

Tsuzuki was surprised that he didn't have an answer. It seemed as though, before today, he would have had any number of responses dancing on his tongue, starting with the events of the night before.

"If I don't want to do something, I will tell you," Hisoka said, slowly, trying to pick his words deliberately from the swamp of phrases in his mind. "And…and…I want to…if it'll make you happy, I want to do it, whatever it is."

"You know that…that it's the same with me." The statement was more hopeful than conclusive.

"Yeah." The embarrassed awkwardness did not leave his expression; sincerity instead stood beside it, in his eyes and voice. "I do know."

"Hisoka?"

"What?"

"Last night, why did you…why did you take a bath after…afterwards?"

Hisoka sucked in his lower lip, biting down on it as if to punish himself for stupidity or meanness or whatever he was accusing himself of in his head. "It wasn't because of you. It-…" He looked away, up, sideways, anywhere but at Tsuzuki, before steeling himself and turning his gaze back to his partner. "It's like I said. I wanted him off me. Completely."

Tsuzuki swallowed, trying to steady his nerves; seeing Hisoka become flustered and upset made him want to be likewise. "Did you do it?"

"He's got his claws in pretty deep, but I think that I…I think that we at least showed him the door."

"Thank God." The phrase was unmeditated, light, genuine. "So…going out's starting to sound like a fun idea," Tsuzuki said, after a pause.

"Is there someplace you want to go? Like I said, I know absolutely nothing about what people do on Christmas…"

"There's no place, really. Oh, unless we want to ask Saya and Yuma if they want us to join up with them. I'm sure they'll have something nice planned."

Hisoka seemed to seriously mull the suggestion over. "There most likely won't be crowds, wherever they're going."

"You really want to go see the girls?"

"They'll probably be too wrapped up in each other to bother me. We can always make a break for it if they bust out the Pink House."

"True," Tsuzuki laughed. He'd brought up Saya and Yuma believing that Hisoka would vehemently protest this plan of action, wanting to see some of Hisoka's normal temper. He'd been disappointed to not see Hisoka's usual self shine through, but somehow this change of attitude was more satisfying. "Well, I'll go give them a call and see if they want company."

"Asking is a waste of time."

Yuma's ecstatic shrieking over the phone confirmed Hisoka's prediction. Tsuzuki walked into his living room from the kitchen, wincing from the ringing noise she had left in his ear, to find Hisoka standing there, the coat he had worn last night already on.

"Told you."

Tsuzuki made a face at him. "She says to come whenever we're ready, so I'll get my coat…"

"Let's not stay too long with them," Hisoka said, as Tsuzuki pulled his coat from the living room closet. Tsuzuki was ready to make a joke about Hisoka's low tolerance for other life forms, when he continued. "I'd rather stay over here than there."

"You want to spend the night again?" Tsuzuki asked, pulling the coat on.

"Yeah," Hisoka said, embarrassment once more coloring his features. "I think it's a good idea. And more than that…I want to. And not just to get rid of him or because you want to," Hisoka added quickly, earnestly. "Because I want to."

"I believe you," Tsuzuki said, astonished and, with subdued glee, almost proud that he could speak so truthfully so easily, that he trusted them not to lie to each other and themselves. It felt like something was finally working the way it should, and that progress made him feel as if he were getting another glimpse of Heaven.

"Good."

Tsuzuki adjusted his collar; satisfied, he didn't think about offering Hisoka his hand before doing so. "Shall we get going, then?"

Equally automatically Hisoka took the proffered hand, locking their fingers together as he stepped closer towards his partner. "Let's."


End file.
